A Shooting Star
by NicciCastillo
Summary: The girls all make a wish that A is out of their lives but they never expected it to come true. When they wake up to find that A is gone, drastic changes are in place. How do the girls fix their mistakes?
1. Chapter 1

**AN: I know this chapter is short but it's only an introduction. **

**Disclaimer: I own nothing**

Aria, Spencer, Hanna, and Emily lounged all over Spencer's room. It was Friday night and they had nothing to do. They were planning a way to spend their winter vacation when Hanna's phone rang. They all went tense anticipating another message from A.

"I hate this," Hanna said shoving her phone in her purse.

"What?" Spencer asked. "What is it?"

"It's just my mom wondering when I'll be home," she explained. "I just hate that I cringe every time I get a text. When is A going to leave us alone?"

"I know," Aria replied. "I feel like my entire life is spent dodging A."

"It's like she's everywhere," Emily said as she gazed out of the window. Just as her words escaped her mouth, all of the girls' phones rang.

"Thinking about me? A." Hanna read out loud. They all stared. Their messages were identical. Hanna chucked her phone across the room. "I'm sick of this little bitch."

"Well," Spencer said matter-of-factly. "What do you suppose we do? March right up to her and take away her phone privileges?"

"Maybe we can get her grounded," Aria scoffed.

"It's not funny," Hanna yelled. "This bitch is ruining my life. Do you remember when you'd give a guy your number and every time you got a text your heart skipped a beat because you thought it was him?"

All the girls nodded.

"Well," Hanna continued. "That doesn't happen anymore. We're too busy worrying about this A person."

"There's no use being angry," Aria told her. "She doesn't seem to be going away."

"Hey look," Emily interrupted. "There's a shooting star. Make a wish."

Each girl turned toward the window and watched the star swish by. They closed their ideas and focused each making the same wish: _I wish I lived in a time when A didn't exist_.

"Who else wished for a pony?" Hanna joked. They all laughed.

After endless nail painting and a pot of Spencer's coffee, they dozed off to sleep scattered all over the bedroom. None of them were aware of the changes that were about to occur.


	2. Chapter 2

**AN: Here's chapter two. I hope you guys like it. I know they're still kind of short but I'm still building up to all of the drama.**

Spencer woke up rubbing her eyes. She looked around to find that she was not in her room. Well, it was all of her furniture and her décor but the room was shaped differently. She sat up in bed and realized she was in the barn. How did she get in there after she fell asleep with the girls in her room. More importantly, how did her furniture end up in the barn.

She put on some clothes and walked into the main house where her parents were bustling around trying to get things done. Her parents obviously had a good teetime because they were both wearing their golf clothes.

"Oh Spencer!" Veronica said. "I'm glad you're awake. We'll probably at the club until late. Can you get yourself to Melissa's?"

"Melissa's?" Spencer asked. This whole situation was confusing but the last time she heard, Melissa lived here. "Why?"

"Her baby shower, of course," Veronica told her. "You promised you would help set up for tomorrow."

"Oh right," Spencer breathed. "I forgot for a minute."

"Sometimes you make me wonder," Veronica laughed to herself. Spencer stood speechless as her parents left the house. Where was Melissa living if she wasn't at the Hastings house?

* * *

><p>"Emily!" Pam called to her daughter. Emily was busy running around her room looking for the earrings that Samara had let her "steal" but she was at a loss. She ran downstairs to find her mom and Ben standing in the kitchen.<p>

"Ben," she smiled. "What are you doing here?"

"We coach the junior high swim team," he said. "Remember?"

"Oh right," she said quickly. "I thought we cancelled it this week."

"No, next," he told her.

"Right," she breathed a sigh of relief. What was going on? Since when was Ben on speaking terms with her? Emily didn't know what to do so she simply grabbed her bag and followed him.

* * *

><p>"Where's dad?" Aria asked when she came down for breakfast noticing that the table was only set for three.<p>

"What are you talking about?" Ella asked her. "Did he say he was coming by today? That is so like him."

"Coming by?" Aria was thoroughly confused.

"What are you doing?" Mike whisper yelled at Aria when Ella was out of earshot. "You know how talking about Dad makes Mom angry. He's moved on. He's with Meredith now. Just let it go."

Aria didn't know what to do. She looked around the room and realized every photo of her father was gone. There was not a trace of him left in the house. Aria picked up her phone and dialed Ezra's apartment but there was no answer. She knew what to do. She ran outside and straight to his place and lifted up the floormat. There it was. The key. A had never existed so she had never taken it. Aria unlocked the door and walked inside. It was empty. There were traces of takeout containers and dinner for two but Ezra was nowhere to be found.

* * *

><p>Hanna strolled through downtown trying to figure out which store to hit up next. She was walking past the pawn shop when she saw Caleb strolling by with his bike. It still hurt to see him but she was slowly getting over it. She could talk to him now without having to hold back her tears or suppress the urge to strangle him. She ran toward him.<p>

"Hey," she said smiling.

"Hi," he said sarcastically using the grin of his.

"How are you?" she asked politely. He was acting weird.

"Are we friends?" he asked finally.

"What are you talking about?" she said as she felt tears begin to sting the back of her eyes.

"You're the homecoming queen," he scoffed. "Do you need something or do you just want to chat?"

"Why are you acting like such a dick?" she yelled before running away. She turned back once more and felt her heart sink when she saw Paige McCullers walk out of the pawn shop and kiss Caleb right there in the middle of the street.

* * *

><p>Spencer got into her Toyota Highlander and turned the ignition. The GPS popped up and she clicked the button that directed her to Melissa's house. She was curious now and ready to put her sleuthing skills to work. The GPS led her to a well sized estate just outside of Rosewood. Spencer got out and walked to the front door tapping lightly. It was answered a few minutes later by none other than Wren Kim. Spencer's jaw dropped.<p> 


	3. Chapter 3

"A never existed," Spencer told her friends as they sat around the barn.

"What do you mean?" Emily asked.

"I made a wish," Aria began, "that A..."

"Me too," Hanna breathed.

"So if A doesn't exist," Spencer explained, "all the things she made us do, they never happened."

"Like the museum ticket," Hanna explained. "A never made me give Mrs. Montgomery the ticket and now..."

"...now my parents are divorced," Aria said. "The museum. My mom said she borrowed my dad's car. That's how she got back together."

"I never told Caleb about it," Hanna continued, "so now I don't owe him anything but we're not even friends."

"The photos," Emily breathed. "A never took the photo strip so I never came out to my mom. That's why I'm still dating Ben."

"This is weird," Aria said slowly.

"What about Wren, though?" Spencer asked. "He had nothing to do with A."

"Who knows?" Hanna sighed. "Maybe with A out of the way, he was able to make up with Melissa."

"Toby," Emily said quickly. "Are we still friends with Toby. I mean, I was his lab partner."

"I don't get it," Aria sighed. "If we want to figure out what A changed, we need to figure out her motive."

"That's kind of hard when she never existed," Hanna retorted.

They all looked around aimlessly. Somehow they were starting to miss the trouble that A caused on their lives. Sure, A hit Hanna with her car, but she also helped Hanna fall in love, not that it mattered now. Aria never quite appreciated A's harassing texts about Ezra but now that her father had moved out, she missed how A made everything fall into place. Emily was still in the closet. As much as she hated A, having this influence in her life had allowed her to face her fears. Spencer was even more confused. Why was Melissa back with Wren?

"Are you guys hungry?" Spencer said looking around at her friends. "Or can we at least go somewhere? I can't stand being cooped up in here any longer."

"We can go for a walk to grab some coffee," Emily offered. "We can take the long way through town."

"Yeah," Hanna answered. "I think that's a good idea."

The girls got their things together and headed for the door. They walked through Spencer's neighborhood and past Ali's house where all of the lights were off. They made their way to town and reached the only coffee shop in Rosewood that was open late. They ordered a round of lattes and took a seat at a table on the patio.

"How do we figure out what changed?" Spencer sighed.

"Do any of you guys keep a diary?" Hanna asked. "Ali was also trying to convince me to do it but I can't get into the routine."

"I journal sometimes," Aria said, "but it's mostly poetry and short stories."

"I think I can help," Emily told them. "Let's go back to my house."

The girls heard a familiar giggle from across the street. They looked up and saw three girls walking together wearing some revealing outfits. The one in the middle had wavy blonde hair that seemed to glow under the street lights.

"Is that...?" Spencer was speechless.

"Alison," Aria finished her friend's sentence.

"Wait!" Emily said slowly. "In order for A not to exist, Ali never died."

"Who are those girls with her?" Aria asked.

"Mona," Hanna said recognizing her former best friend. "...and Jenna."

"Jenna's not blind," Spencer realized. "She and Ali were friends."

"Do you think Ali died," Aria asked, "because she was friends with us?"

The four friends sat in silence for a moment letting everything sink in. Then a dark figure walked by coming closer and closer to them. Spencer recognized Ian's face.

"Ian," she breathed.

"Spencer," he smiled leaning over to give her a kiss on the cheek. "I've been texting you all day."

"Sorry," she smiled uneasily. "I've been busy with Melissa's shower."

"Well," he let out an awkward laugh, "I see that I'm interrupting girls' night. Spencer, why don't you just give me a call later?"

"Okay," she smiled as he walked away.

"It's okay," Emily said rubbing Spencer's shoulders. "I know it's weird but he's not a killer. Ali's alive."

"I know," Spencer replied, "but it's just so surreal."

XXX

The four girls sat around Emily's room on their laptops trying to uncover clues from their past. Hanna, the social butterfly, was on all the networking sites she could think of while Emily dug through her old diaries. Spencer and Aria were researching every newspaper in the area for local news on them and their friends.

"I found something," Emily said looking up at her friends.

"What?" Aria asked her.

"Ali shared our secrets," she explained. "We stopped being friends with Ali just before the Jenna thing so she told our secrets. The Montgomery's never moved to Iceland because Ali told your mom about Meredith before you could."

"What about me?" Spencer asked.

"Ali told your sister about Ian because she was jealous," Emily read off her screen. "Once it was out in the open you guys started dating. You probably didn't have a chance to kiss Wren because you were with him."

"Is there anything about what she did to you?" Hanna asked her.

"Not really," Emily told her. "It's more about things I didn't do. I never met Maya because her family never moved in. I guess I'm still in the closet."

"Look at this," Spencer pulled up a photo of Hanna which was dated from a year ago. "It's you."

"No it's not," Hanna breathed. It was her, but she weighed even less than she did now and she was wearing an evening gown.

"There's more," Spencer told her, "you've been Junior Miss Rosewood for the past two years. You're the resident queen bee."

"I guess that explains why I have two thousand virtual friends," Hanna laughed, "but I don't get it."

"You weren't in Ashley's shadow," Aria explained. "You guys are social competitors."

"This is such a trip," Emily sighed shutting her laptop.

"There's one more thing," Spencer told them. "I can't find anything on Toby."

"What if he's..." Hanna said slowly.

"No," Spencer told her. "Don't say that."

Then Aria pulled up an obituary about a year old. The name Tobias Cavanaugh was listed next to a photo of the suspect they had come to love. Cause of death: Burned alive. Spencer held back tears when she saw it. This changed everything. The girls weren't expecting an innocent wish to turn their lives upside down and they had no idea what was coming next.


	4. Chapter 4

**I am about to throw some crazy scifi stuff your way and I apologize if it doesn't make sense. I'm not really used to writing anything like this. Anyway, even if it sounds completely crazy, trust me, I do have an explanation. Just be patient. Also, thanks for all of the reviews. I really didn't think anyone would be that interested in this story but you guys have inspired me to keep writing.**

The four girls stood around a stone plaque with the name Tobias Cavanaugh engraved on it. Spencer was beyond tears while Hanna placed a loving arm around her. Emily and Aria were speechless. How do you tell your friend you're sorry you accidentally wished her boyfriend would die?

After almost and hour, the quartet, led by Spencer, slowly backed away from the grave and walked back to Emily's house. They headed inside the house avoiding Emily's mother and walked upstairs to her bedroom. Spencer sat in the bay window staring at the mailbox across the street. It was the last thing she had left of him. The silence in the room was too much for her. She knew her friends were trying hard to help her through this but they could never understand. Finally, she excused herself and went home.

"So Toby died in the fire," Emily breathed. "I can't believe we made this happen."

"Em," Aria gave her a hug. "You can't blame yourself. Right now we need to figure out a way to fix this."

"The Tipler cylinder," Hanna said finally. "Time travel. Lucas was telling me about it."

"Hanna, that's ridiculous," Aria told her.

"It's ridiculous that we ended up in parallel dimension where A doesn't exist," Hanna told her. "If our wishes are literally coming true, we can obviously entertain the idea that time travel is possible."

"She's right," Emily said.

"I can't listen to this," Aria said standing up. "I'm going to Ezra's."

"Don't you mean Mr. Fitz?" Hann asked. "Think about everything else that's changed."

"That's impossible," Aria said. "A had nothing to do with me and Ezra."

"Just, be safe," Hanna told her defeatedly.

"Thanks," Aria smiled before turning to leave. She walked across town to Ezra's building stopping to pick up lattes for them. When she finally arrived, she tapped lightly on the door and he answered in just a pair of running shorts and beads of sweat forming along his forehead.

"Aria," he said when he saw her. She breathed a sigh of relief.

"What are you doing here?" he asked.

"Sorry," she smiled. "I should have called first but I just wanted to see you. I brought coffee."

"Aria," he said again, "I don't mean to be rude, but this isn't really appropriate. You know, I'm your teacher after all."

"You don't remember," she breathed as tears welled up in her eyes. She tried again. "B26."

"Is that a number I should play on the lottery tonight?" he laughed. "Aria, I'm confused."

She couldn't stand it anymore. She dropped the coffee tray she was holding and ran out of the apartment crying. She had never gone to Iceland so she'd stayed friends with the girls. There was no reason for her to go to that bar and meet Ezra. A had screwed up her life real bad this time and now she didn't know what to do. Maybe Hanna was right. But time travel...that's crazy.

* * *

><p>"You can't seriously think we're just going to march up to this guy and ask him about time travel?" Emily asked Hanna.<p>

"Lucas told me about him," she replied.

"Oh yeah," Aria glared. "How did that go?"

"It was kind of weird at first but then we got to talking," Hanna explained. "He really likes this kind of stuff and he tried to teach it to me but I just don't get physics like he does. Anyway, this guy Marty Longo claims that he's traveled through space and time before."

"I don't think it's a good idea," Aria said.

"I'm in," Spencer said sitting in the corner. That was the first thing the girls had heard her say in days. "I think we should at least meet him."

"Come on!" Hanna said. "We have to go tonight. He says the portal only opens tonight at midnight."

"Let's go," Emily said getting up.

"I don't know," Aria breathed. "I think I'm going to stay here."

"Here," Hanna handed her a balled up receipt with the address. "If you decide to come."

Emily, Hanna, and Spencer grabbed their purses and walked toward the door. They turned to look back at Aria one last time but she didn't budge. They walked out of her room and made their way to the address that Hanna had written on a small piece of paper.

"Well," Hanna said before she knocked on the door. "Here goes."

"Are we sure about thi..." Emily was about to ask but before she could finish, a flash of light burst from the doorbell and swallowed the girls. The three of them were disoriented by the speed of their travels and blinded by the bright lights. When they finally stopped moving, they were ejected onto the cold hard ground and went unconscious from the collision with the earth.


	5. Chapter 5

"What happened?" Hanna said sitting up. She looked over to find Emily and Spencer on either side of her. Then she looked up. With another flash of light, a small figure was hurled right on top of her. She groaned "Ow."

Hanna pulled out a compact from her purse and took a look at herself. She looked different. Her face was thinner and her hair was lighter. She looked like Ali.

"What the...?" she breathed.

"Where am I?" the figure said rolling off of Hanna.

"I think we're in the woods behind my house," Spencer said sitting up. She turned to look at her friends. "Who are you?"

"Spencer?" Hanna asked her friend who now also resembled Ali. All four of them did.

"Is this part of the wish?" Emily asked looking around.

"I don't know," Spencer sighed.

"Look!" Aria said. She pointed at a flash of yellow fleeing through the woods. "Tonight's the night of the sleepover."

"So we're all friends again?" Hanna asked.

"I guess so," Spencer told them. "Those are our bikes."

"So we fixed it!" Aria smiled. "Everything's back to normal."

"Yeah," Hanna smiled. "Come on. Let's go check on Toby."

"Okay," Emily sighed.

The four grabbed hands and walked toward the cemetery. They arrived a few minutes later and checked for Toby's grave. Nothing. He was alive. Spencer breathed a sigh of relief and turned to walk away. The girls sped up as they left the cemetery. There's something about that place that always creeped them out.

"What do we do now?" Aria said slowly.

"I guess we wait for another portal," Hanna replied.

"Well," Emily said quickly, "how long until that happens?"

"Don't look at me!" Hanna pleaded. "I didn't even think it would work."

"I know," Spencer said storming back toward the shed.

"What are you doing?" Aria yelled running after her. "Where are we going?"

"Oh no," Hanna breathed. She knew exactly what Spencer was about to do. She caught up to her and grabbed her arm. "No, you can't."

"I have to," Spencer told her. "Otherwise who knows what could happen. We could lose someone else. Maybe you. Maybe Caleb."

"You can't do this," Hanna told her. "It's not right."

"What?" Aria asked. "What's going on?"

"Ali has to die," Spencer told her looking down at her hands. "The reason they can't find a killer, is because the only prints they got were her own."

"Spencer you're scaring me," Aria told her but it was too late. Spencer took off back toward the woods and out of sight.

"We have to stop her," Hanna said grabbing her friends' hands.

"No," Aria told her. "We tried messing with destiny before. We have to let it all play out."

"You're letting our best friend murder our other best friend," Emily told her.

"We can't stop her," Aria replied.

"Of course we can!" Hanna pushed her friend out of the way.

"She's right," Emily said. "We need to trust that A will fix this."

"I'm starting to dislike this A person more and more," Hanna said finally retreating.

The three of them stood around waiting for almost a half hour but there was no sign of Spencer. Finally Hanna couldn't take it anymore. She wasn't sure she liked the idea of fate a whole lot...and she definitely didn't like that she looked just like A.

"Should we go find her?" she asked breaking the silence.

"Maybe," Aria breathed.

"Yeah," Emily said finally. "We should definitely go."

The three of them got up and walked back to Spencer's house. When they arrived they saw her standing in Ali's backyard pouring dirt into the whole where the DiLaurentises were about to build their gazebo. Spencer looked up and saw them. Then she dropped the shovel and walked toward her friends.

"I can't believe you did that," Hanna told her.

"I had to," Spencer replied. "To save Toby."

"I don't get it, though," Emily said. "If we stopped being friends with Ali, how come everything went back to normal after we went through that weird flash of light thing?"

"I don't know," Aria replied. "I guess we just fixed it by going back in time to before the wish was made?"

"No," Hanna smiled. "We didn't travel through time. We traveled through space. In another dimension, Toby did die. That's the dimension that we belong in."

"I don't understand," Emily said.

"Those girls in the shed," Hanna was speaking animatedly now. "They're a version of us from this dimension. We live in another dimension where things like magic and time travel exist. They don't. We don't belong here. I think that's why we all look like Ali."

"Yeah we do," Spencer told her. "How else did you expect Ali to die."

"We need to go back!" Hanna told her.

"And how do you suppose we do that?" Aria asked.

"That Longo guy," Hanna explained. "We'll go back to his house. He has to know the answers."


	6. Chapter 6

**Hey! Thanks for reading. One review said it's kind of like Donnie Darko. Honestly, I could not sit through that movie, but I guess it is kind of similar. It's also starting to be a little like Inception if you look at Toby's grave as their token haha. Anyway, I hope you like it and definitely let me know if something doesn't make sense.**

"Hello!" Hanna called out loudly as she stood in front of the tony cabin. The four girls had been outside knocking for almost ten minutes. Hanna tried the knob. The door swung right open.

"Anyone here?" Emily asked into the dark room.

Aria flipped a switch flooding the room with light only to reveal a trashed living room with two small stones lying on the ground. Spencer walked over to pick them up and realized they fit together. She pushed the two pieces to form a circle and suddenly another flash of light engulfed the girls. Their bodies traveled through a portal of space until they landed right back in the same living room. This time, looking like themselves.

"I think we're back," Hanna said glancing at herself in a mirror.

"I hope so," Emily sighed. "This whole thing is starting to get too freaky."

"Come on," Spencer said getting up. "Let's go check for Toby's grave."

A few minutes later the girls were standing in the Cavanaugh plot. Toby's name was not among any of the headstones and they couldn't find any clues to the fact that anything was off. Eventually they tired of being in a cemetery and made their way back toward Spencer's house.

"Wait!" Aria said pointing ahead to two dark-haired girls. "Is that...is that me?"

"And me?" Emily was shocked. "How can we..."

"Let me try something," Hanna said grabbing Spencer's hand. The pair walked over to their friends' dopplegangers and smiled.

"Hey," Spencer said to them. There was no answer.

"Emily?" Hanna asked. "Aria?"

"They can't see us," Spencer said.

"What is going on?" Hanna sighed.

* * *

><p>"So we're invisible?" Emily asked.<p>

The four friends were sitting in a circle by the town square hoping someone would recognize them. Ten people had walked by without even acknowledging their presence and Hanna's mom had driven by without giving them a second look. Emily was fiddling with a crappy prepaid phone that was lying on the ground.

"Don't you think we should find whoever owns that?" Aria asked her. "It's not like we've got anything better to do."

"Like they'd even be able to see me?" Emily retorted.

"Wait!" Spencer snatched up the phone from Emily's hand and started typing away furiously. A second later her own phone received a text. She pulled out her fancy smart phone and composed a text.

"Spencer what are you doing?" Hanna asked.

"Look," she said holding up the crappy phone. "My text comes up anonymous."

"What? Why?" Aria was confused.

"Our phones are from another dimension," Spencer said.

"This is way too bizarre," Hanna told them. "Are you trying to say that you are A?"

"I thought there wasn't an A," Emily said. "We wished her away."

"No," Hanna corrected her. "That hasn't happened yet. Look at the trees. We went back in time."

"So we're A?" Aria breathed. "Why would we do this to ourselves?"

"Because we know what would happen if we didn't," Hanna said.

"That doesn't make sense," Emily told them. "We fixed it. We should be able to go back."

"I have a better idea," Spencer said. She grabbed her phone and began a new text message. A second later, Aria's phone buzzed.

"Maybe he fools around with students all the time. A lot of teachers do. Just ask your dad," she read out loud and her face went pale. She turned to Spencer. "What are you trying to do?"

"Warn us!" she exclaimed. "We need to let our alternate selves know about how Ali died and what we can do to stop it."

"Are you crazy?" Hanna yelled at her. "Do you know what A does? Are you aware that Ali tried to kill me by running me over? Is that what you're going to do?"

"No, Hanna, no," Spencer sighed.

All of a sudden Hanna lunged at her trying to get the phone out of her grasp. Hanna pulled at her hair and Spencer let out a blood-curling scream.

* * *

><p>Spencer sat up in bed with a start. Her breathing was shallow but she could tell that she was back in the room she belonged in. She looked at her phone and checked the time. It was nearly five in the morning. Everything had simply been a rotten nightmare. She finally regained her composure and suddenly her phone beeped once again. She looked at it and read a text message: I know all of your secrets but now you know one of mine – A.<p>

**I know the dream ending is really overrated but you couldn't expect me to make Spencer a real killer plus it explains why nothing makes sense. I wanted to throw some curveballs your way so it really did feel like a dream. Anyway, thanks for reading and the reviews :)  
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